communicate :: collaborate :: commemorate

It's been six weeks with the Huawei P10. And they have been absolutely boring, in the best possible way. This thing just works. It has received two updates since I got it, but they are not the very latest Android security fixes. It's currently two months old, but Huawei does make an effort to not only update the very latest phones but also older ones.

I have made fun of Huawei when they announced the Leica partnership. But the camera in the P10 delivers. Great colors, sharp photos, beautiful monochrome pictures from the 20MP sensor. In low light others perform better, but in normal to bright light I love the results.

I like close-up shots and those turn out better on the P10 than on the iPhone. If I only had the P10, I would not be missing much, just the iPhone telephoto lens. The selfie camera is very capable as well, but you do have to switch off the beautify filter. Otherwise you won't recognize yourself. The camera app has some neat tricks like the open aperture or the portrait mode as well as a ton of other modes that I find distracting. Unless I have a real camera with buttons and dials I want a camera app that does the thinking for me. Frame the shot, set focus and light, shoot. Modify later.

I dislike custom Android shells, and that extends to EMUI, the Android experience Huawei delivers. It's holding the company back. The P10 runs on Android 7.0 instead of 7.1.1 and it is their most recent flagship. The hardware however is perfect. Slim yet solid, great screen, no camera hump. It charges very quickly over USB C when connected to the Huawei charger. In SuperCharge mode it only takes half an hour to get over 50% from a dead battery. The fingerprint reader is impressive. It's the quickest I have ever seen. I customized EMUI to make the fingerprint reader also my home button. The off-button sits right where your right thumb rests, it is easily distinguishable from the volume rocker above.

I recommend the matte black version. No logo on the front, a very subdued Huawei logo on the back. It's a good phone to buy, if you really want to avoid the iPhone.